r- / r ' ,/ 24 Prophet. ' You and Ira are singing." "We're what?" "You're singing 'Love Is a Many- Splendored Thing.' " "Oh, have mercy, Serena! Not 'Love Is a Many-Splendored Thing.' " "You sang it at our wedding, didn't you?" "Yes, but-" "That was what they were playing when Max first told me how he felt about me," Serena said. She lifted a corner of her shawl and delicately blot- ted the shiny places beneath her eyes. "October 22, 1955. Remember? The Harvest Home Ball. I came with Terry Simpson, but Max cut in." "But this is a funeral!" Maggie said. "So?" "It's not a... request program," Maggie said. Over their heads, a piano began thrumming the floorboards. Chord, chord, chord was plunked forth like so many place settings. Serena flung her shawl across her bosom and said, "We'd better get back up there." "Serena," Maggie said, following her out of the bathroom, "Ira and I haven't sung in public since your wed- ding!" "That's all right. I don't expect anything professional," Serena said. "All I want is a kind of rerun, like people sometimes have on their golden I t .d "'" 1 l' 1 ' """""'" '" . 'f t" ".. --- ,. \. """'''^'oGW..-......... , / ). . I , . \ . 'f 4 c.t.... " / \, '''\ ., \ (' x lÀ J"-: ".l<.....,ç. Co ':. l''I(o )<.... , ,, ft ' .: , ! 4'1,. .." < . < i J anniversaries. I thought it would make a nice touch." "Nice touch! But you know how songs, well, age," Maggie said, wind- ing after her among the tables. "Why not just some consoling hymns? Doesn't your church have a choir?" A t the foot of the stairs, Serena turned. "Look," she said. "All I'm asking is the smallest, simplest favor, from the closest friend I've had in this world. Why, you and I have been through everything together! Miss Kimmel's first grade! Miss van Deeter! Long division! Our weddings and our babies! You helped me put my mother in the nursing home. I sat up with you that time that Jesse got arrested." "Yes but-" , "Last night I started thinking and I said to myself, 'What am I holding this funeral for? Hardly anyone will come; we haven't lived here long enough. Why, we're not even burying him; I'm flinging his ashes on the Chesapeake next summer . We're not even going to have his casket at the service. What's the point of sitting in that church,' I said, 'listening to Mrs. Filbert tinkle out gospel hymns on the piano? "Stum- bling up the Path of Righteousness" and "Death Is Like a Good Night's Sleep"? I don't even know Mrs. Fil- bert! I'd rather have Sissy Parton. I'd rather have "My Prayer" as played by i 1 . ". I , 4 I \ , )- -./. . \; 1 JULY 4, 1988 Sissy Parton at our wedding.' So then I thought, 'Why not all of it? Kahlil Gibran? "Love Is a Many-Splendored Thing" ?' " "N ot everyone would understand, though," Maggie said. "People who weren't at the wedding, for instance." Or even people who were at the wedding, she thought privately. Some of those guests had worn fairly puzzled . expressIons. "Let them wonder, then," Serena said. "It's not for them I'm doing it." And she spun away and started up the stairs. "Also, there's Ira," Maggie called, following her. The fringe of Serena's shawl swatted her in the face. "Of course, I'd move the earth for you, Serena, but I don't think Ira would feel comfortable singing that song." "Ira has a nice tenor voice," Serena said. She turned at the top of the stairs. "And yours is like a silver bell; remem- ber how people always told you that? High time you stopped keeping it a secret. " Maggie sighed and followed her up the aisle. No use pointing out, she supposed, that that bell was nearly half a century old by now. " S EVERAL other guests had arrived in Maggie's absence. They dotted the pews here and there. Serena bent to speak to a hatted woman in a slim black suit. "Sugar?" she said. Maggie stopped short be- hind her and said, "Sugar Tilghman?" Sugar turned. She had been the class beauty and was beautiful still, Maggie supposed, although it was hard to tell through the heavy black veil descending from her hat. She looked more like a widow than the widow herself. Well, she always had viewed clothes as costumes. "There you are!" she said. She rose to press her cheek against Serena's. "I am so, so sorry for your loss," she said. "Except they call me Elizabeth now." "Sugar, you remember Maggie," Serena said. "Maggie Daley! What a surprise. " Sugar's cheek was >1' t " f ., "Great meeting, R.M.-and, hey, thanks for the incandescence." 1 .1$1:,. . ' , 'm , < 1- : , f :t," " .1 / 1ïP t'1'